First, let’s be honest here: Hollywood’s been terrible at this for forever, and probably in some ways always will be. And right now, we’re in the middle of a film industry meltdown; attendance is dropping like a stone, fads are dying off, and movies that should be huge hits are instead dropping like flies. The Lone Ranger cost $215 million and made $244 million at the box office, for example, and it was far from the only disaster this summer. And all of this, mind you, is building to the summer of 2015, which promising to be a gut-wrenching trainwreck that will probably destroy several franchises for good. So a lot of film types are panicking, and as a result, they default to what they “know” makes money: Action movies starring dudes, because it’s still the 1980s and Angelina Jolie doesn’t exist.

Hollywood is a numbers game, and they’ll tell you repeatedly that the numbers just don’t support anything other than gigantic movies starring dudes. Of course, eventually somebody will take a risk, and all that will change; expect an absolute flood of cheap horror movies this time next year, for example. But until then, anybody who wants to make a Wonder Woman movie is fighting very dumb people with lots of money who think they’re really smart; that’s a hard fight to win.

Previous Attempts Have Been Terrible

To their credit, DC and Warner Brothers have been trying for years to get a Wonder Woman movie or TV series off the ground. The last go-round, they got David E. Kelley to write a pilot, they filmed it…and then they buried it like it was radioactive waste. And for, we might add, excellentreason, as by all accounts radioactive waste was more fun to watch.

The good news is, they know they mishandled the property. The bad news is, that has seemingly scared them into timidity even more.

Wonder Woman Has A Difficult History At DC

You ask somebody for the best Batman stories, they’ll pull out The Dark Knight Returns, or Batman: Year One. You ask for the best Superman stories, they’ll pull out, say, Superman: Red Son or For All Seasons. Ask for the best Wonder Woman stories and you’ll generally get mumble mumble something something George Perez, or a few issues out of Greg Rucka’s run where he was fighting editorial like Leonidas at the pass. Even a list on sites like Newsarama can’t come up with ten books where Wonder Woman is actually the solo star in a list of great stories about Wonder Woman.

Granted that Brian Azzarello has a killer run going with Wonder Woman right now, but the reality is, the character has a rough history at DC. She’s never had more than one book at a time, that book has sometimes had a spotty publication history, and let’s not even get into Amazons Attack!. This is a problem both because movies are generally built on the comics as a starting point, and if DC is uncertain how to treat one of their most popular characters, that uncertainty will echo up the line.

Casting Is Everything, And Insanely Difficult

There’s a pretty surefire way to know that a studio can’t figure out how to cast a role; every single actor remotely recognizable is being ‘considered’ for it. And so it is with Wonder Woman: Name an actress, no matter how laughably inappropriate, and she’s probably been rumored for the role.

True, they could cast an unknown, and they’re trending towards that with superhero movies, but, well, see above about Hollywood stinking. And to be fair, Wonder Woman is a tough, tough role: It’s both physically and emotionally demanding in a way that Hollywood is scared to ask of actresses in the first place, and is hard to find period. The number of actors who have perfectly captured a superhero (or supervillain) onscreen are few in number; Christopher Reeve, Hugh Jackman, Heath Ledger. It’s like finding a needle in a haystack. That hates needles.

Will they make a Wonder Woman movie? Eventually. The demand is there. But it’s going to require both a shakeup in Hollywood, and for the character to get a lot more respect from the people who publish her adventures.

I mean, don’t get me wrong, I like wonder woman just fine. While I was reading your article though I decided you’re right: with a SMALL handful of exceptions, the memorable comics I’ve read with Wonder Woman in them were not focused on her, she was either teamed with Superman/Batman or the wider JLA. The best single portrayal of wonder woman in media (sorry Linda Carter) in my opinion is Susan Eisenberg’s portrayal on the JL/JLU cartoons, and even then only a handful of the episodes are focused on her. On the rare occasions I go to comic conventions there may be one lady there doing her as cosplay; usually vastly outnumbered by women doing feminized versions of traditionally male characters.

So I find it difficult to blame DC for this; they have done ALOT of stupid things, but I wonder if the actual demand for a Wonder Woman media TV show or Movie is there or no. Surely they’ve at least done some market research to get an idea of the answer themselves, right?

-The TV show is almost 40 years old, and wasn’t nearly as big a hit as you think. It had to be dramatically retooled each season it aired, eventually getting canned after 3 seasons. Nostalgia by kids whose first crush was Linda Carter is the only thing keeping it in the social consciousness.

-How many of the animated movies was she the major star in, again? And how successful were those?

-You can buy off-the-shelf costumes for damn near every niche character. I’ve seen nothing to indicate Wonder Woman merchandise flies off the shelves anywhere near as much as top tier properties; in fact, I can’t think of any product lines really focused around her, nor does there seem to be any demand for any.

Keeping Wonder Woman around is pretty much just good publicity for DC, but she isn’t going to be a money-maker any time soon.

Completely off-topic, but how in the world did Uproxx not cover the fact that scientists have basically invented lightsabers?[www.cnn.com]

The better comparison would probably be Thor. His comics don’t sell as well as people would imagine (or as well as my shelf would indicate), he has a weird set-up (Is he a god? Is he simply a more powerful species? Is he Donald Blake or was Donald Blake created as a punishment for him?), and there’s the whole “Where is Asgard located?” business. Yet, he got a movie made, it did well, and we are slated for a sequel.

Ant-Man, for all his sucking, his a character who is fairly integral to the Marvel universe (creator of Ultron and, hey, what do you know, Ultron’s in Avengers 2) and his movie is coming out far into the run of the popular Marvel movie universe. He’s being tied into a product that is already popular whereas DC has not really developed an expanded universe like that and has had some issues even getting Superman movies out.

Plus, the big problem with Wonder Woman is that no one agrees how they should write her. For example, I loved the way they portrayed her on the JL/JLU cartoon; for the first time, I understood what made her special. I have been informed on Twitter that I am a moron, that the cartoon totally made her second fiddle to Batman and Superman, and that it ruins the character completely. I also liked her animated movie (which apparently did quite poorly in sales). Again, I was informed by the Wonder Woman fans that I was an idiot because that movie missed the character and also ruined Steve Trevor.

My point is, the fandom that rips me for liking the cartoon versions of the character are the people who are most vocal that a Wonder Woman movie HAS TO HAPPEN!!! However, they seem upset by any version of the character that has been put into the mainstream in recent years. That’s fine, I get it (I don’t like the Nolan Batman movies for example).

This goes back to your point about there not being a lot of definitive Wonder Woman runs: No one seems to know what to make of her character or what her core principles are. That makes making a movie so much more difficult because you don’t know exactly what her core fans actually want nor do you know exactly what to do streamline her mythos since apparently any change makes them freak out. Add in the fact that they swung and missed on the Green Lantern movie, they are extremely gun shy.

I’ll go see the Wonder Woman movie when they make it, and you’re right that they will. I just don’t blame them for not getting it out yet. She’s not as simple to do as her fans suggest .

My overall point, though, is that arguing whether or not a character is “relevant” is bullshit. If Marvel can turn a second-string superteam into a big budget movie and get Ant-Man, who has even fewer definitive solo runs than Wondy, up, “relevancy” is not an issue here.

As others have mentioned, Ant-Man makes sense for marvel to do as a setup piece for the Avengers sequel, since he is the creator of its main villain. I cannot imagine if Marvel was in DC’s position of struggling to find its footing movie to movie they would green light it.

That seems unrelated to whether making a big ticket Wonder Woman movie is actually a good financial move for DC/Warner right this moment. I would be right the watching it with most everyone else here, I’m just concerned that maybe Warner’s apparent assessment of the actual audience for it might be closer to correct.

I also watched the 2009 animated movie after seeing you mention it (had somehow not done so previously, not sure how), and while it was decent I found the Steve Trevor aspect of it to be pretty poor. Not that fillion did anything specifically wrong, there was just a lot of tiptoeing around the core issues with the character and her expression of femininity. It ended up just being kind of rote and bland in that area.

Also Hera’s little invocation leading into the sculpting scene was more than a little creepy.

Medusa, Dr Psycho (who totally could have been Peter Dinklage before that Underdog movie stamped out Dinklage’s last nerve about dwarves). Eh. There’s more. I like that the minotaur was her personal chef for a while.

I don’t have any concrete facts or sources to disagree with your “hollywood stinks” section. But I swear whilst there have been massive flops (that john martian bullshit etc) other films have been absolutely killing it. There have been more 1 bill films than ever before no? Also some absolutely great films have been made Cloud Atlas being one of my favourite films to come out in a long long while. Genuinely captivating.
Sounds like a cynical grumpy Dan Seitz or maybe I misunderstood.

I should clarify that every movie, in Hollywood, eventually makes money. The problem is that right now they don’t want to ‘experiment’, and they point to, say, a Katherine Heigl movie tanking as proof “women don’t want to see women” or some other garbage.

I’m sorry, but if you can make two “Thor” movies, WW should be doable. A little camp wouldn’t hurt. Make Circe the baddie, have her concoct a spell that literally turns all men into pigs and have WW whoop some ass. And cast Mary Elizabeth Winstead as WW. Shit, man, don’t overthink it…eyes on the JLA prize, anyway…

The problem is that DC and Warner seem to think that any amount of humor is kryptonite to their tights-wearing properties. They’re gonna hold on to the whole “gritty-to-the-max” thing until that grip turns to rigor mortis, financially. I wouldn’t be surprised if the eventual WW movie had a painful, bloated Act I dedicated entirely to inject unnecessary realism into the whole Amazonian thing.

Or ridiculous dialogue like this: “My lasso is woven from a special fibre created out of a rare Amazonian plants. When it makes contact with skin, the chemicals on the rope send neural signals to the part of the brain responsible for truth-telling…”

Make it a period piece from the 60s-70s run where wonder woman had no powers and broke through the glass ceiling and cast katherine heigl as WW. That way we get all the shopping and outfit changing montages we can handle. Cast mark wahlberg as corporate boss mark ares her demanding yet endearing boss. will they? won’t they?

Are you saying that there are just a huge number of “blockbuster” type movies scheduled to come out? Or that they are all going to suck? Because I have no reason to see why anything from Marvel Studios is going to suck. Sure, some are better than others, but they seem to have learned from their mistakes and are correcting them as they move forward building a film version of their universe. If only Fox and Sony would play nice so I could have Spiderman in Avengers 3 or New Avengers and my XMen vs Avengers.

Compare Wonder Woman to the two most popular female protagonists among females in the last few years. “Mopey faced Twilight girl caught betwixt a sparkly beta male and a dog” and “Ms. put weird stuff inside me, handsome billionaire pervert”. Wonder Woman is way to realistic for that crowd. Unless DC goes for a purely male audience with her (which they won’t), I feel like the head-scratching will continue for a very long time.

Realistically, a Wondy movie should be what Hollywood used to call a “four-sector” movie. I show up, you show up, our parents show up, everybody wants to see it. The problem is that they think “women don’t want to see women” or whatever.

I think the casting is the issue. There might not be classic stories, but you really only need the seeds of a great story. Look at the Nolan Batman series, he took pieces of great stories but told original ones at the same time. In terms of casting you want someone who is an Amazon… or as Amazon as Hollywood can get. It’s difficult to find someone like that for the role.

The Flash is pretty hard to do because most audiences are going to struggle accepting that he can have problems with ANY of the villains in his Rogue’s Gallery outside of Reverse Flash and maybe Captain Cold.

Couldn’t this be summed up with “Men in positions of power are afraid a franchise with a female character wont appeal to men”? Same reason that Legend of Korra was a “surprise” hit on Nick that made them order a second season.

Casting a Wonder Woman movie would be a nightmare. Hollywood can’t blow off her physicality and go quirky with a female equivalent of Michael Keaton. They’d be stuck with Jessica Biel who has the charisma of soggy graham crackers.

WB will no longer trust a big budget movie where the female superhero is the lead. Period. Despite the problem being horrible casting and execution rather than concept, CATWOMAN and ELEKTRA crushed any hope of WW getting a serious solo push.

So I say it eternally: Make a Wonder Woman origin film disguised as the first JUSTICE LEAGUE movie. Villains: Greek Gods (who turn out at the end to be the Darkseid-banished-and-brainwashed New Gods). Surround her with Cyborg, Flash, Green Arrow, Black Canary, Booster Gold, and Blue Beetle (we need to see a hero die onscreen…Ted Kord, white courtesy phone) and make up some reason why Superman and Batman aren’t there.

So is she going to leave Paradise Island because she wants Steve Trevor to tickle her lady parts or because she’s a diplomat from whatever they renamed her island whose job is to tell men they’re doing it wrong?

The first one is beyond politically incorrect in the 21st century, and the second one sounds like a perfect job for Janeanne Garafolo.

Yeah, actually, there was an entire discussion of Catwoman I cut here, but it’s worth remembering that Catwoman is what studio executives were convinced women wanted out of a superheroine movie; a gay best friend, sexual aggression, and lots of affirming applause. It’s the “Glitter” of superhero movies.

I think a big problem is also that a hgue chunk of the comic book fans are utter sexist assholes. Look at any discussion about Wonder Woman and the most talked about thing is always will the actress have big tits. That’s it. That’s all.

Option 1: Go speak to that woman who is trying to fund a videogame with a strong, feminist heroine as the protagonist and other prominent mainstream feminists about how to develop a strong female protagonist in the 21st century action films. Modernize WW’s clothes to make them not look so sexist. Put this feminist Wonderwoman into an action film and have the feminists make every woman go see the film out of sheer guilt (ie: if you don’t support this film you are not a real woman, etc). But make the action entertaining and typical blockbustery so misogynists won’t feel threatened about their manhood by going to watch this film. Make her have two BFF’s (one black, one spanish to fill diversity quota) and go gritty. Women have plenty of reason’s to be pissed in this world. Have humor similar to Thor’s films.

Option 2: Realize you’ll never have a huge hit with the traditional version of Wonder Woman (women won’t watch it and nerds will rage too hard and other men won’t go watch it because they don’t want to be seen as pervs) and just make a Black Canary film starring Kate Upton.

Or they could just make a good action movie starring a woman. Again, a Wonder Woman movie is not “for women”; it’s a blockbuster where everybody shows up. That’s the audience: The people who went to go see Iron Man and the Avengers in droves.

Let’s face it, Wonder Woman is just not a compelling character. Her appeal has always been skimpy sexy outfit. Skimpy sexy outfit can be used to describe 98% of female superheroes and villains in comic books.

I think it will depend on the Batman vs Superman movie. If that bombs (which I don’t think it will) then we may not see another DC movie for awhile. If it doesn’t then surely they will start looking at a Justice League movie.
A starting point for the movie could even be a battle between the Amazons and … spilling over into the outside world. The Amazons don’t trust the two but realise they need them in order to keep their island hidden. Or the movie could go off a recent series which has the island being levelled by mercenaries and the survivors being hunted in the U.S.

If they’re so afraid to pull the trigger on a WW solo movie, then what they have to do is make sure she’s the stand out performance/character of Justice League. If they absolutely nail it as a supporting role, then at least they’ll have a built in recognition of the character and the actress.

Also, on another aspect of modern action filmmaking, why not just reel in the production cost a hair? It doesn’t have to be a city-destroying 100 million dollar explosion – just make a good movie with a solid story and a good character.

Women and girls are wanting, begging, pleading for strong female super heroes. There is a huge market (over 50% of the population) just waiting to be tapped. We see it in the popularity of role models like Katniss Everdeen. The merchandising of Wonder Woman is good because women want it, and they want to see more of her in the media. Can people in the media get a clue and figure out how to write a super hero story that appeals to women, maybe by, I don’t know, employing female writers? Gee, what a concept?